I am quite disappointed by the tone igame3d has hit in this thread. The no rosetta rule has been there since the start of the contest, there's no need to suddenly be a jerk about it.

Constellation is a promising entry, but the rules are NOT arbitrary. A lot of work has been put into getting this contest running, and creating rules which are as fair as possible, while making sure that as many people as possible can play them now, and in the near future.

The rule against PPC only code is also in place because other people are supposed to be able to build and learn from the source code even in a year or two, and use the code for future projects, and there's no arguing that the PPC is obsolete in that respect.

The rule was primarily drafted with C source code in mind, and might make little sense from this POV for architecture-agnostic Director scripts, *but* Director 10 was released in 2004, and predating the Intel switch, it is also obsolete. Sorry that you're stuck with it, but shit happens.

There's still two weeks for mattness to sort this out, and I am sure he can find somebody with an up-to-date copy of Director to build his final submission for him. Should he not be able to find somebody a few days before the deadline, we can talk, civilly, about modifying the rule for his benefit, or give him time until the end of voting to sort this out.

DoG Wrote:I am quite disappointed by the tone igame3d has hit in this thread. The no rosetta rule has been there since the start of the contest, there's no need to suddenly be a jerk about it.

The rule doesn't affect me.
At the start of the contest there was no way of knowing who would get
bent over and nailed from behind by the people who organize this contest.

I've been dicked without a kiss twice already in these contests.
If I see someone being similarly raped, i'm going to yell rape.

Rape! Rape!

DoG Wrote:Constellation is a promising entry, but the rules are NOT arbitrary.

Thats a matter of opinion by who? By persons whose effort in
this respect has been to draw developers in and yank their chains.

DoG Wrote:A lot of work has been put into getting this contest running, and creating rules which are as fair as possible,

How much sweat and sleep did the organizers losing coming up with this one lame rule?

Fair to who?
Certainly not to the mac game developers.

DoG Wrote:while making sure that as many people as possible can play them now, and in the near future.

Big assumptions are made arbitrarily by "I know it all" egos.

DoG Wrote:The rule against PPC only code is also in place because other people are supposed to be able to build and learn from the source code even in a year or two, and use the code for future projects, and there's no arguing that the PPC is obsolete in that respect.

You don't know the code won't work in the future.
You have to spend $999 to make the code do anything anyway.
Same deal with Unity.

DoG Wrote:[The rule was primarily drafted with C source code in mind,

A short sighted jerk decision.

Three contests we released our C source code to this community.
Three times the promises by uDevGames of making it available have failed to come to fruition.

Every single time uDevGames took money and failed to deliver.
That amounts to criminal activity.

DoG Wrote:and might make little sense from this POV for architecture-agnostic Director scripts, *but* Director 10 was released in 2004, and predating the Intel switch, it is also obsolete. Sorry that you're stuck with it, but shit happens.

It works on the mac today, it doesn't suffer from Rosetta.
It builds in the latest version making the source code valid to anyone who has either version and is therefore capable of running into this mysterious future some people think they can predict.

udevgames can not have access to Director's compiler code, plain and simple.
So if a particular binary uses any version of such code it makes no difference what so ever.

DoG Wrote:There's still two weeks for mattness to sort this out, and I am sure he can find somebody with an up-to-date copy of Director to build his final submission for him. Should he not be able to find somebody a few days before the deadline, we can talk, civilly, about modifying the rule for his benefit, or give him time until the end of voting to sort this out.

He should not be jerked around, plain and simple.

This is not an isolated case, its a chronic condition and one more nail in the coffin of this event.

Getting sensitive about my tone shows that some people have too much
ego to see their thinking is not popular or fair.

They should be ashamed and remember their previous mistakes before they
make the same and worse ones on a repeating basis.

Igame3d/Bill - I appreciate your defense of my cause, but it is a bit antagonistic. I'd like to be diplomatic about this.

Though my software is out of date, my code shouldn't be. It should compile and build on a registered version of Director 11. If I have to find someone else to do the final build, I can try to do that, but I'd rather have more control over it in case something doesn't look right. There are subtle differences in the font rendering and such between D10 and D11 as can be seen in my workaround build.

As far as making my game playable into the future, I would also like to do that, and its in my interest to do so. I plan to continue working on Constellation after the contest, and have built an update notification system into it. I plan to make a universal build eventually, but given the impending release (but no official announcement, so potentially no free upgrade) of a new version, it really doesn't make sense for me to upgrade at the moment.

I'm going to email Carlos and see if he can make a more official ruling on this.

mattness Wrote:Igame3d/Bill - I appreciate your defense of my cause, but it is a bit antagonistic. I'd like to be diplomatic about this.

I'm sorry you are caught in the middle, but it goes way beyond you and this one rule.

I've known this 'gang' for seven years.
I'm very sorry I didn't warn you sooner.
When this issue first came up:
1) I had no intention of participating in this scam
2) The rule didn't affect me
3) I had no way of knowing you'd actually finish a game of this quality.
4) because of 1) I didn't feel it was my place to argue

1 and 3 are false now so hi-ho-hi off to arguing I go.
Jerky rules have been argued over every time this contest comes up.

Some people light candles in the dark, others carry a torch, I bring the napalm.

Allow me to suggest a helpful compromise: that the rule be changed to disallow games that are source-incompatible with the Intel platform, i.e. if it can't be compiled without changes, then it's out. That stops people from using obsolete APIs, but doesn't push out people who are a revision behind the latest tool, i.e. mattness.

Speaking as just a player of the games entered into the contest, I can say I would be very very disappointed if Matt ends up not being able to enter the contest. Constellation is well done and I've spent more time playing it than any other game in the contest so far (aside from my own, but that's sort of a given ;p )

Even if the rules don't get changed, I would be in support of making an exception for Constellation so Matt can enter. Besides, the success of the contest, IMO anyway, is the number of good games that result from it. I can't see how cutting one of the better games out of the contest can help things.

diordna Wrote:Allow me to suggest a helpful compromise: that the rule be changed to disallow games that are source-incompatible with the Intel platform, i.e. if it can't be compiled without changes, then it's out. That stops people from using obsolete APIs, but doesn't push out people who are a revision behind the latest tool, i.e. mattness.

JustinFic Wrote:Speaking as just a player of the games entered into the contest, I can say I would be very very disappointed if Matt ends up not being able to enter the contest. Constellation is well done and I've spent more time playing it than any other game in the contest so far (aside from my own, but that's sort of a given ;p )

Even if the rules don't get changed, I would be in support of making an exception for Constellation so Matt can enter. Besides, the success of the contest, IMO anyway, is the number of good games that result from it. I can't see how cutting one of the better games out of the contest can help things.

I tried, but, bloody bugger off, Bill/igame3d. Nobody forced you to enter the contest. If you have been so baaadly burned by this organized, criminal, and detestable mob before, maybe you shouldn't have entered, but maybe it has to do with you being an insane jerk. Everybody else is acting on good faith, why can't you.

You single-handedly manage to give all the people who *volunteered* to stage this contest a bad taste. If you seriously believe the rules were made to piss off the entrants, and Carlos and the rest of the gang are sitting high up on their thrones, laughing and pointing, then just get the f*ck out. I'll even reimburse your entrance fee out of my own pocket, if that can spare us from your half-witted conspiracy theories.

For everyone else, sorry if you're caught in the crossfire, but igame3d's idiotic remarks just create in me a warm, fuzzy feeling of genuine rage.

Discussing it with Carlos etc, the rule has been tweaked. Without a doubt you'll be allowed to enter if you can only get a PPC build before the end of the contest, but a Universal Build would still be a good thing, even if you have to submit that one following submission deadline.

--Back to me--

I've posted to my Director mailing list, and will do my best to get a universal build made.

For what its worth I do think the rule is a little restrictive. I knew this might be an issue ahead of time, and I almost didn't enter because of it. I've been having fun though, and so I'm glad I did. Thank those who organized it.

I'd like to say that everyone on this community seems like good people. I'm sorry to have sparked such a flamewar.

I'm happy to see that you all were able to work towards a common consensus. I've been lurking in this thread to see how it would play out. I've been accused in the past of being a megalomaniac and told I need to be able to share responsibility for the site/contests more. Thus I watched from the sidelines.

The 'mission' of uDevGames often seems like poetry in that when read, each person walks away believing or seeing something different. I created the original rules in 2001 and they have been tweaked and improved. This year's rules were formulated in a secret bunker.. err, I mean they were worked on by a group of monks.. err, some guys who wanted to get me off my arse worked on the rules and gave them to me. For the most part, I think they did a great job. I asked for some changes here and there. I might have asked for more tweaks, but put my trust in the volunteer members' work. Of course prior to the next contest, the community can discuss new tweaks, etc. That is, if you can state your position in a level-headed manner. Most of know I highly dislike flaming and other mud slinging. Some might see that as bad, but it is necessary in order to keep the community going year after year.

This is a good time to thank all those who have helped in the contest since 2001. I'm going need a hand shortly with the voting system so I would appreciate further assistance. Also a great time to remind you that you need to visit those sponsors, try their demos, send them thank yous -- uDevGames must remain as a win-win for everyone.

igame3d Wrote:Its too bad people react to the truth and open discussion with rage.

What utter nonsense. You called everyone who volunteered to help make uDG happen a bunch of egotistical theiving jerks who purposefully try to screw people over and cheat them out of participating. That's absolutely no way to have a discussion.